Thank God for Momma

I haven't had much time to blog, but I want to make sure my mom gets a huge shout out! My mom, Vera (a.k.a. Grammy), came to the rescue on Saturday afternoon. I called her and asked her to come up early because the lack of sleep was really starting to get to me. She came with arms wide open and doughnuts in hand. After soothing me, she took to soothing little Maddy Mae and let Matt and me get some much needed sleep. Grammy has been taking the night shifts so I can get up to feed Maddy and go right back to sleep. What a difference it has made to my mental and physical well being.

Mom, I love you very much and appreciate everything you are doing for us. It means the world to me. You are making everything easier for us and I can't thank you enough. Thanks for being such a great mom. I only hope I can be the mother you have been.

All my love,
April

First doctor appt

Maddy's first appt was today. She passed with flying colors. She is
back up to her discharge weight of 7 lbs. 9 oz. The doctor helped
settle a lot of nerves for mom and dad. She didn't really mind to much.

Unforgettable

Viacord (Cord Blood Banking)

Friends and Family,

We have decided to store Maddy's cord blood. Some of you may know what this is, if you don't you can find more info here. We are by no means asking for donations but I know certain people asked if there was anything they could do to help. If you would like to help out you can click Contribute. We appreciate all the love and support for everyone and hope you are enjoying watching Maddy as much as we are. She's a sweet little baby and we can't wait for everyone to meet her.

Car ride

We had to get the little green Acura fixed so papa can drive it while
mama's on maternity leave. Maddy did wonderful on her second car ride.
She might have opened her eyes one time but that's it.

To sleep or not to sleep

Maddy did great last night. She slept most of the night in between feedings. Mom and dad both got more sleep last night than in the combined nights since her birth. Daddy did find himself trying to do stuff at night instead of sleeping. That quickly changed after the surge of tiredness hit.

We are trying to get her use to the difference between day or night. We are also reading a great book call "The 90 minute sleep program" that we got from our dear friend and new parent Amy Rossi. It talks about the amount of sleep babies need, why and how to find the signs that your baby is tired because they don't really know when they need to sleep.

We weighed her today and she is down to 7 lbs. We are kind of concerned but I hope that just means she finally pooped out all the black tar. The new poop is much easier to clean up. She has her first doctors appt tomorrow, so we will see how she is doing and if there is any thing wrong.

We haven't really taken many pictures lately, I have a couple videos I will post later.

Mommy's First Blog Entry

It is 11:52 a.m. and today is the first day that Maddy has slept for a 3 hour period in her own bed. Daddy is fast asleep and I can't seem to go to sleep even though I'm exhausted.

I want to thank Matt for being such an amazing support person. He has been incredible and I am really nervous about him going back to work next week. He's been so good about keeping up the blog and keeping all the people that care about us in the loop. I do apologize for the diaper change video - wasn't aware that was going live! ;o)

I know so many of you have called to check on me and left voicemails and emails. I am sorry that I haven't gotten back to all of you. I do want to talk to each of you, but finding time is really difficult right now. Just know that I love you all and I really appreciate you thinking of us. The gifts, the flowers, the food...all mean so much. I will make a plug to give me some time on the thank you cards though.

Life as a new mom is an incredible ride. I can't believe that we created such a beautiful baby, and that nothing in the world matters when she is in my arms. It's amazing that one minute y0u are throwing back the covers, ready to scream because she won't stop crying, but the second you pick her up to soothe her and she looks at you with those eyes, you completely forget what you were frustrated about. How you can love something so much so soon is unbelievable. I thank God everyday that we were so fortunate to have had such an easy birth and a healthy baby. Everything else we just deal with one day at a time.

I love you all. - Mom ;o))

Facebook

So I finally cracked and signed up for facebook. Not really sure how it works, but I guess you can search for Matthew Ledom.

Sweet Baby Girl

So Daddy's has gotten in to the bad habit of letting Maddy fall asleep on his chest. She likes it so much she doesn't sleep in her bassinet anymore. We are working on trying to fix that.

The last couple days have been a blur. It all feels like the same day. We tried last night to sleep when she sleeps but she kept waking us up. Daddy passed out in the recliner with Baby on his chest. He was going to try and put her in her bed after she was in a deep sleep but it was just to comfortable and he was WAAAYYY to tired to be able to stay awake.

Momma and Maddy have this breast feeding thing down to a science. The only problem right now is Maddy keeps falling asleep in the middle of it. She has started to gain weight again. When we left the hospital she weighted 7 lb. 9 oz. and today we weighed her at 7 lb. 10 oz.

Momma and Daddy have been doing a good job acting as a team. We gave Maddy her first bath today and it went great. You can see the video in the last post we did.

We have had a couple visitor come by the house to see our little cutie pie!!! We look forward to seeing everyone if you get a chance to stop by.

First Video Editing

Here is a video I put together 3 video we shot with our Flip Ultra HD mini camcorder. Thanks to all those that gave me gift certs to Best Buy for my birthday!!! I started playing with iMovie on my new Mac and was able to put the 3 videos into 1 with some transitions and a title screen...Hollywood here we come.

Photos of the past couple days

Madalyne's Second Day

Madalyne's Homecoming and Beyond

Working on the blog

I have video chat setup on my computer if any of the parents want to see little biscuit live. This is a shot of me and her getting ready to update the blog. I was able to get anonymous commenting working as well as name/url. If you would like to leave a comment and do not have any of the needed accounts please select "Name/Url" from the dropdown below the comment field. This will ask you for a name and url, you don't need to fill out the url. Then when you are done click Post Comment and it will ask you to verify a code word, just type it in just like it shows on the screen and you're done. Send me an email if you are having trouble.

I will be posting more pictures and video but will most likey just have links on here over to my picassa web albums.

Semi-pro pictures

There was a company at the hospital that took some cute pictures of Maddy. You can see them here:

http://www.our365.com/NewbornPortraits/BabyDetail.aspx?birthid=27e19222-39f2-44be-85fd-ad8fd895bd12

Ga Tech here I come!

This is our newest GA Tech yellow jacket after I told her the Ga Bulldogs are currently ranked higher than the jackets in the pre-polls. What's the good word!!!!

Happy father's day

As I sit here at 4am rocking my new baby I was thinking "when was the
last time I was up at 4am". I am not sure when it was but I'm sure the
last thing I was thinking was definitly not rocking a beautiful baby
girl. I never would have thought that something as simple a rocking
your baby could be so satisfying. Just watching her sleep in my arms
melts my heart, a heart that does not easily do so. Everytime I look
at her I can't help but smile. Those little body jolts she does makes
me laugh. I'm sure in the future for father's day I will be getting
ties and tools and a bunch of other things to collect dust around the
house but today...right now has to be the best father's day present I
could ever recieve. I now am starting to understand the miracle of being a father. I look forward to the day that you all will get to meet my sweet baby girl Madalyne Mae.

Happy father's day to all the fathers and grandfathers. I appreciate all you have done for us, now more than ever! Thank you.

Hi everyone!

I wanted to say hi to everybody. I've been doing wonderful. I'm
starting to get really good at eating, problem is I sleep in the
middle of it so momma and daddy have to continue bugging me. You like
my pretty bow?

Fred's help

This is a picture of Fred helping April with the contractions. Image Fred breathing through them. He He He He...I was quite humorous.

Maddy's Room

For some of you that will not be visiting I wanted to show you some of the handy work that April and I have been working on in Maddy's room. Some of you know that we have installed new doors for her closet. They are chalkboard doors. This is a picture of the art work we have created to welcome Maddy Mae home. Note the sweet endangered blue spotted potato bug (that was all Daddy)!!!

Maddy's changing

Speaks for itself.

Day 2

Mamma is doing much better this morning. After a little trouble with burping we were able to get a couple much needed hours of sleep.

Maddy is doing a great job with nursing. Momma and baby are really starting to connect. We have had plenty of experience changing diapers. She is being a very good girl this morning.

Momma and daddy are going to take a walk around the hospital while grammy watches over Madalyne.

We will start expecting visitors when we head back to the house. Thanks for all your kind words, Maddy is look forwarding to meeting all you.

Final words for the day

Everyone is safe and sound snug in their beds with images of margaritas dancing in their heads (well maybe just momma's). Its been a long day and now its time to get a couple winks. I will leave you with this final image of my two sweet ladies passed out from a hard days work.

-Ledoms out!

First outfit

April did awesome!!!

She popped out in 4 contractions!!!! Momma was a super pusher. She got an A+ from the delivery mid-wife.

Momma and baby are connecting. Madalyne is having her first lunch. Momma is getting ready to have some McDonalds. We will be posting more later.

We are going to spend some time with her and will let you know when you can come visit.

Thanks for all your support!!!

Love,

The Ledoms

New Ledom has arrived...there goes the neighborhood!!

Welcome Miss Madalyne Mae Ledom:

Born: 6/19/09 at 2:31

Weight: 8lbs 1 oz.

Length: 21 in